Nonapod: I dunno; hasn't Obama been pretty much always ahead by slightly higher than MOE, and his support base slowly eroding until the Tsunami of the Debate Heard Round the Electorate? I don't really follow the polls, but I sort of felt that was the trend.

(And, note, that's with wonky D+6 or D+11 samples that were common in the summer; I think recent ones have settled on more reasonable D+1-4 or, slightly less reasonable than D+1-4, but more reasonable than D+9-11, R+1-3 sample sizes.)

At this point, you don't have to cherry-pick polls to argue that Romney is WINNING. What with Romney's recently-revealed Greatness, the persuadable women of America finally snapping to the hateful narcissism of Obama, and the worse-than-Watergate Libya scandal, everything is looking rosy for Mitt.

Romney appears to be pacing it properly. He holds serve in the tonight's debate and he ticks off another comfortably run mile while Obama is huffing and puffing a little more.

If you carefully watch a distance race and see two runners running together virtually the entire time, you can see the precise moment where the winner destroys the spirit of the loser. The winner kicks it up a quarter step, the loser trys for about four strides to keep up but then you see the shoulders collapse and resignation take over.

Now the guy who takes off that quarter step sometimes breaks too soon and can be reeled in if the other guy doesn't give up. Then you have a great race to the end.

I don't see a big win happening; if it happens, it will probably be on the scale of how Obama beat McCain (sizable, but not a blow out.) Of course, that didn't stop people from claiming a mandate, so, whatever.

Alan Colmes mentioned on his radio show the fact that the polls all seem to be skewing toward Romney. His exasperated question to the GOP was, in essence, "If you thought the polls were rigged and skewed before, why do you believe them when they are in your favor?"

The point Colmes misses is that if one assumes the polls are rigged because those behind the work want to see Obama re-elected, those same polls skewing toward Romney, with that bias already baked in, are doubly devastating for POTUS.

It is funny to watch the left hype the "gender gap", which in their parlance this means a deficit of women for Romney. But the race is tied, and there are only two genders, so there must be a corresponding gender gap of men for Obama. Do they really think hyping the one does anything except highlight their pro-Obama bias?

Not so fast. As we saw recently, one debate performance can change quite a bit (unfortunately, because it appears sheeple put more stock in that than policy). If Obama has a good night while Romney has a poor one, everything could swing the other way. On the other hand, Romney could sew it up tonight and odds are he knows it.

If this debate goes the same way as the last one, as far as Obama's performance is concerned, don't expect the liberal punditry to lose it like they did on the last one. They are steeling themselves today to ward off any such outbursts. ManBearPig will probably blame the air again, though.

Haven't we seen this before? As the election gets closer, the pollsters with D+6 or D+9 suddenly start using D+3 or less. On a funny note, in a weatlthy, mostly liberal Denver neighborhood, I've been seeing a panhandler with a sign "Give me a Dollar and I won't Vote for Romney". I bet he's been raking in a bundle.

I have seen several Romney-Ryan signs going up, lots of bumper sticker on cars around my area (suburban Arapahoe County, one of the main swing counties for the swing state of Colorado). Very few Obama signs and bumper stickers.

Scott M said...If Obama has a good night while Romney has a poor one, everything could swing the other way

This is not quite true. If the exact same perceived difference occurs in the second debate (whichever direction) the impact will be smaller for two reasons. (1) The portion of swayable voters has decreased, and (2) the reason the first debate had such a dramatic effect was audience expectations. Since expectations among undecideds are largely set by the MSM they believed Romney was a scary religious nut and an economic idiot to boot. This debate can't have the same effect because expecations are different.

Also, everything is going to be looked at in reflection of the last debate. "Well, I guess Obama isn't as terrible as I thought," will be the thought not: "Well, that last debate was a non-event I should ignore."

Ultimately, has any debate been as talked about as what, someday, may be known as the flashpoint in the 2012 election?

Here’s why some Democrats are worried tonight. If Romney wins the three Southern battlegrounds (FL, NC, and VA) and OH, he is at 266 electoral votes. Leaving the other five battlegrounds unallocated, that means Obama would be at 237 and Romney would only need to win one of the remaining five states to get to 270+. See the map above.

One senior Democratic official expressed real concern tonight unlike I have heard before about Ohio potentially slipping away from Obama (the state has been trending Republican in statewide races, Rob Portman has become a force, religious and gun groups are flooding the state with voter contacts, two of Romney’s top strategists have recently won a statewide race there, etc).

Haven't we seen this before? As the election gets closer, the pollsters with D+6 or D+9 suddenly start using D+3 or less.

Thereby motivating/panicking Democratic voters who wouldn't have bothered voting when all the polls were showing a comfortable Democratic win? Not implausible. If an election hinges on turnout, as this one certainly will, it's in both candidates' interests to portray it as neck and neck -- and that, moreover, in as many states as possible.

It must be heartening for the Republicans to see, finally, some actual enthusiasm about Romney, as opposed to the "Well, at least he's better than the last guy/gal who imploded" vibe that ran through the interminable primaries. Meanwhile the Obamamania of 2008 is certainly missing this year. And the thing about close elections in which the level of enthusiasm is about the same between the parties is that Republicans tend to win them, because their part of the electorate generally shows up to vote.

Last night I sat through the most blatant push polling I have ever experienced. Got a call last night at 9pm - gal on the phone wanted to talk to the woman voter of the household. After I told her there wasn't one, she asked me if I was familiar with [CA] Prop 34? Uh, sure. (It's the one to abolish the death penalty. I knew there was one, didn't know what number it was.)

She then goes to tell me of how much money we will save that can go to the schools, and parks, and libraries, if we don't have to pay for that pesky appeals process, and how there have been over 800 people sentenced to death in Cali and only 13 that have been executed. (Sad, but true. Most DP inmates die of old age.)

After all that, she asks me how I intend to vote. I said I was undecided. I lied. I didn't feel like telling her that if we had a more rational appeals process like Texas, we would be killing a lot more dudes who needed killing.

If this is an example of the polling that people are subjected to, it's no womder there is a 9% response rate, and that the numbers are so far divorced from reality.

Last night I sat through the most blatant push polling I have ever experienced. Got a call last night at 9pm - gal on the phone wanted to talk to the woman voter of the household. After I told her there wasn't one, she asked me if I was familiar with [CA] Prop 34? Uh, sure. (It's the one to abolish the death penalty. I knew there was one, didn't know what number it was.)

She then goes to tell me of how much money we will save that can go to the schools, and parks, and libraries, if we don't have to pay for that pesky appeals process, and how there have been over 800 people sentenced to death in Cali and only 13 that have been executed. (Sad, but true. Most DP inmates die of old age.)

After all that, she asks me how I intend to vote. I said I was undecided. I lied. I didn't feel like telling her that if we had a more rational appeals process like Texas, we would be killing a lot more dudes who needed killing.

If this is an example of the polling that people are subjected to, it's no womder there is a 9% response rate, and that the numbers are so far divorced from reality.